Welcome back to our regular Builders’ Journeys column, where we take a look at sets from years gone by, through the eyes of someone for whom that set has a special significance. Today, Branko from New South Wales, via the Netherlands brings us a tale of his childhood, with 6950: Mobile Rocket Transport. This set was released in 1982 and has 209 pieces. Tat year also saw the debut of the yellow spacemen, and this set came with two of them!
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The impact of the pandemic continues to affect many people around the world. Here in Australia, the states of Victoria and New South Wales are currently under lockdown/stay at home orders, to minimise spread of the delta variant, while vaccines are rolled out.
This coincides with the weather stating to improve, as spring approaches. I was hoping to catching up with some friends in the near future to go on a Toy Photo Safari. We were looking forward to taking our LEGO Minifigures and other action figures out into the wild, getting our cameras down to their level, and taking a few pictures. The restrictions currently in place for Victoria and New South Wales are likely to put a hold on those plans for the next couple of months.
The limitations of the current situation came up in a chat with some friends in South Australia, who recently cancelled their real world Brickstameet due to a short local lockdown. And so we have decided not to wait, and take the meetup online.
This weekend, The Rambling Brick, and South Australia’s Brickstameet team are looking forward to working together to host ‘Snap!’ a virtual toy photo safari.
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Welcome to another edition of Builders’ Journeys, where Adult FANS of LEGO present a set that was, in some way, pivotal in their development as a builder.
Today, we hear from Sue Ann Barber. Sue Ann has been around the LEGO Fan community for many years, and is one of the founders of MUGs – the Melbourne LEGO Users Group. I first met Sue Ann in January 2008, when I attended the public expo at Brickvention with my family. Her passion for the hobby was apparent, and she introduced me to the concept of being an Adult Fan of LEGO, and the concept of LEGO User Groups. As such, she is one of the people I credit with bringing me out of my Dark Ages.
Sue Ann is going to tell us about a set, released in 1974, that inspired her earliest attempts to create a MOC (My Own Creation).
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The last time I was having a chat to adult visitors at a public exhibition (remember those?), something came up on more than one occasion: LEGO® Themes these days are not what they used to be. It used to be pretty simple – you’d build the set (and it was probably Town, Space or Castle. Unless you were a bit younger – then it may well have been a Pirates set) – and you’d pull it apart and build something else. It might be one of the alternate builds on the back of the box, it might be something completely different. It may not have even been related to the original theme.
These days, many sets thrive on 3rd party IP, and the majority of the in-house, story-driven themes are tied in with either an animated series or an overly complicated app.
For those of us yearning for a simpler time, in a world where things have become increasingly complicated, things are looking bleak! Unless you want to go straight to the 4+ sets.
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Like each wave before them, this wave of LEGO Super Mario sets has brought a new collection of buildable figures. The figures have been a little hard to get hold of until recently, particularly in Australia. The boxes of Buildable characters brought a disturbing revelation: While we maintain the count of 10 characters in the series, there are only 18 blind bags in the box. Reports from several Blogs with a full box suggest that (if you get a new box) the front 9 figures on either column of the box side are identical, while the rear one at each end is either Crowber or Bony Beetle.
The team at Toybricks were able to fix me up with a set of the figures, through COVID Safe delivery. Today, we can take a look, look at the characters, as well as look at their relative scores, and other special behaviours…
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Thanks for joining us for another Throwback Thursday, in which we take a look into our reader’s personal Builder’s Journeys. Take that old set that is important to you for some reason, and write up a paragraph or two about why it is important to you: was it your first set, the set that brought you out of your dark ages, or something else entirely?
This week we hear from Greg M aka @danishspaceprogram over on Instagram. Greg lives in Indiana, USA, and has graciously shared his story today, where he takes us to Iceplanet2002 to revisit at 6896: Ice Sat V.
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The home of the brick, the LEGO House, in Downtown Billund dominates the landscape. Entering the building is simple. You don’t even need a ticket. You enter, and find yourself in the main ‘town square’ you can visit the LEGO Store, cafe’s and the ticket office. And beyond that… well, how much time do you have?
You can probably see most of the LEGO House in a day. You probably won’t do much else, and by the end of the day, you will be determined to finish it, just as a matter of principle.
But this is not a post about the LEGO House, but rather the latest book from Chronicle Books. – The Secrets of the LEGO House: Design, Play and Wonder in the Home of the Brick by Jesús Díaz. This volume landed on my desk at an unexpected time, and is available to order now.
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This Imperial Light Cruiser forms the base of operations for Moff Gideon during the second season of The Mandalorian. The minifigure selection in this set is based on that final confrontation between the Mandalorian and Moff Gideon, with several other supporting cast from the season also included. This review might contain some spoilers for the episode.
The set has 1336 pieces, and 5 minifigures. It went on sale on August 1 2021, world wide. I was fortunate to be sent a copy by the LEGO Group for review. So, how does the largest regular set of the August 2021 wave stack up? Read on to find out.
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This year sees the 20th anniversary of LEGO Harry Potter sets, and there is an extra special set for those who have wished they were the right size to go with their LEGO Harry Potter sets: Icons of Hogwarts: Hedwig, Spelel Books, Potions and herbology samples; Chocolate frogs, Scarves, a Wand, the Golden Snitch, and of course the Letter of Acceptance.
With 3010 pieces, 73691 LEGO Harry Potter Hogwarts Icons Collector’s Edition Set will be available from 2nd September 2021 from LEGO Stores and www.lego.com/harrypotter at a recommended price of 249.99 EUR / 249.99 USD / 229.99 GBP / 1999 DKK / 399.99 AUD / 29980 JPY / 449.99 NZD / 349.99 CAD.
Most of the images leaked into the wild a few days ago, but I’ll present them here for completeness.
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Back in the mid 1970’s, I was prone to bouts of tonsillitis, and, as was the fashion back then, I went into hospital for a tonsillectomy. Apart from a spectacular bout of coughing up blood a few days later, everything was unremarkable.
But that’s not what I remember most vividly.
Certainly the diet of jelly and icecream were a highlight, but within 6 months I had forgotten them.
I remember receiving 687 Caravelle Aeroplane around this time. The wings were the first ‘non rectangular’ elements that I owned, the printed bricks were terrific as a way to represent the windows, and the wheels. They offered a special challenge.
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The Rambling Brick 
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